Star’s Heart Condition Keeps L.I.U. on Edge

Julian Boyd, center, watched the N.C.A.A. selection show with teammates after a yearlong ordeal that included months of tests and conflicting medical advice.Credit
Piotr Redlinski for The New York Times

Julian Boyd should not be playing basketball. That’s the standard medical advice for people who, like him, have a malformed heart. Because so little is known about his condition — known as left ventricular noncompaction — medical experts recommend against playing most competitive sports.

But on Friday, Coach Jim Ferry is expected to lean hard on Boyd when Long Island University faces North Carolina in the N.C.A.A. men’s basketball tournament. Boyd is the team’s leading rebounder, one of its two top scorers, and — at 6 feet 7 inches and 225 pounds — possessed of a size that comes close to matching North Carolina’s imposing presence on the court.

“He’s going to be a big key in this game, like he is in every game for us,” Ferry said.

Boyd, 21, is back playing basketball after a yearlong ordeal, one that involved months of tests, a torrent of conflicting medical advice and coming to terms with the possibility that his athletic career was over. The team decided to let him play last summer after a cardiologist ruled that medication had returned his heart — not fully developed while in the womb — to normal functioning.

Since then, Boyd has shown up to every game, averaging 26 minutes of playing time. He said he asked Ferry at the beginning of the season to treat him like any other player. “I told him, I don’t want you to coach me timid,” Boyd said. “Every time I’m out there, I’ve got to play as hard as I can.”

Stories of athletes felled by malformed hearts appear with sobering regularity. On March 3, a Michigan high school player collapsed moments after he made a winning layup; an autopsy later concluded he died from dilated cardiomyopathy, known as an enlarged heart. A few days later, a Colorado rugby player with a heart condition died after taking a hit to the chest during a match.

None of the cases appear to involve Boyd’s particular condition, which was identified by doctors and researchers relatively recently and is still not well understood. Dr. Alfred Bove, a cardiologist who has worked for N.B.A. and N.F.L. teams and is a past president of the American College of Cardiology, said he had not seen many cases of athletes with Boyd’s condition.

For people with his heart defect, “the risk is probably higher than it can be with a normal heart, but nobody can really quantify it,” Bove said. In general, he added, the statistical risk for sudden death while playing sports is very low.

Even so, the stories make for a haunting backdrop for Boyd and those close to him.

“I think about it all the time,” said Danny O’Connor, the head athletic trainer at L.I.U. “It’s in the back of my mind all the time.”

Boyd’s stepfather, Terrell Thames, calls his stepson a “beast of a kid.” Even though he knows Boyd has been cleared to play, “every time he takes the court, it’s a little nerve-racking,” Thames said.

Boyd was a promising athlete and about to enter his sophomore year at L.I.U. when he collapsed after a pickup game near his home in San Antonio and was rushed to the hospital with severe muscle cramping.

Tests disclosed two serious conditions, possibly unrelated: the heart condition, and a tendency of his muscles to cramp. Doctors in San Antonio initially told him he would never play again. But after Boyd arrived on campus for the fall semester, L.I.U. officials urged him to get a second opinion.

While doctors tried to determine whether he would play again, Ferry said Boyd tried to talk him into letting him on the court. “He’s like, ‘No, I’m fine, I’m fine,’ ” Ferry said. “I’m like, ‘No, Julian, you’re not.’ ”

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During one such conversation, Ferry pointed to a black-and-white photograph in his office of a man playing basketball. “I said: ‘Julian, do you know why that guy’s picture is there?’ ” Ferry recalled. The man in the picture, Ferry explained, was John Jennings, a former teammate from Ferry’s playing days at Keene State College in New Hampshire. Jennings collapsed and died of a heart attack while throwing a pass during a game one year after graduation. “I don’t want a picture of you in my office right now,” Ferry said he told Boyd. “I said: ‘We’re lucky. We know something’s up.’ ”

The wait was all the more difficult for Boyd because he felt healthy. “I would have rather had a torn A.C.L. or a broken ankle or something like that, something I could actually feel,” Boyd said. “I felt fine every day that I came out here. I wasn’t in any pain.”

Finally, a cardiologist at Mount Sinai Medical Center in Manhattan ruled that the medication Boyd had been taking was working; he is still taking it.

Photo

After missing last season, Julian Boyd has played every game this season and become the Blackbirds' leading rebounder and one of their two leading scorers.Credit
Piotr Redlinski for The New York Times

O’Connor, for his part, keeps a close eye on Boyd during practice and games to prevent his muscles from cramping. Because the heart is also a muscle, O’Connor said, there is concern that severe cramping could affect the heart.

In addition to staying hydrated, Boyd takes a potassium supplement and eats raisins, which are rich in magnesium, before and during games. O’Connor sends him home with a gallon of Gatorade and strict orders to finish it, since he has been known to cramp in the middle of the night. Boyd has also overhauled his diet, avoiding hamburgers and junk food for meals that are full of fruits, vegetables and lean proteins.

He said he does not undergo regular tests of his heart, but may have one after the season has ended. In general, he said, he leaves the medical details to his trainer, doctor and coach.

The precautions seem to be working. Boyd said he cramped less than he did in the past, although he did suffer a serious episode in a game against Robert Morris. Boyd was pulled in the final minutes and the team lost by a point — a loss that Ferry attributed to Boyd’s untimely exit. “But I’m not going to take a risk on that,” he said.

Thames said Boyd’s lost year might have helped him become a better player. “It gave him an opportunity to really watch the game and see things,” he said.

Boyd said his ordeal has injected urgency into his game. He follows the news stories about athletes who have died, but does not let them dissuade him from pushing himself on the court.

“Every game, I play like it’s my last because I’ve been shown that it really could be,” he said. “If anything were to happen ever again, I want to be able to say the last game I played was with everything.”

A version of this article appears in print on March 16, 2011, on Page B11 of the New York edition with the headline: Star’s Heart Condition Keeps L.I.U. on Edge. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe